Previews, Reviews & Features: June 1 through July 6

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THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE WEEKLY ENTERTAINMENT GUIDE

29-05 JUNE

JULY

Our top picks for fireworks and festivities throughout the county PAG E S 6 - 1 1

TO BE OR NOT TO BE…

Tickets on sale tomorrow at 12 Noon.

By William Shakespeare Directed by Barry Edelstein

(619) 23-GLOBE (234-5623)

August 6 – September 10

TheOldGlobe.org

DEPA RTMENTS RADAR.......................................4 COVER STORY ............................6 DINING ....................................12 BEER .......................................13 POP MUSIC ..............................14 THEATER .................................16 MOVIES...................................20

GRINDHOUSE HORROR MEETS ACID WESTERN

L I ST I N GS EVENTS ....................................11 MUSIC .....................................15 STAGE ......................................17 ART/CLASSICAL MUSIC ............19 MOVIES....................................21 MOVIE TIMES...........................22

Keanu Reeves, Suki Waterhouse and Jason Momoa star in “The Bad Batch” — just how bad is this batch?

I N FO R M ATI O N ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR Michael Rocha, (619) 293-1724 michael.rocha@sduniontribune.com ADVERTISING John Fields, Sales Manager (619) 293-2547 john.fields@sduniontribune.com MAILING ADDRESS: Night&Day, P.O. Box 120191, San Diego, CA 92112-0191 FAX & EMAIL: (619) 260-5082; night&day@sduniontribune.com GETTING LISTED Event information should be submitted to our online calendar at utsandiego.com/news/ entertainment/things-to-do at least three weeks before publication.

Limited space prevents printing all submissions, but we attempt to publish a representative sample.

NIGHT & DAY is published each Thursday.

SAN DIEGO TRADITION

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San Diego Symphony opens its popular Bayside Summer Nights season this weekend with “Star Spangled Pops.”

THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE WEEKLY ENTERTAINMENT GUIDE

29-05 JUNE

Our top picks for fireworks and festivities throughout the county PAGES 6 - 11

ON THE COVER Design by Gregory Schmidt • U-T

PE M RF LA us O S t c RM T 5 lo A se N Ju CE ly S. 2.

Night + Day | THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE | THURSDAY • JUNE 29, 2017

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JULY

TA L K TO US

James Hebert Twitter: @JimHebert Facebook: UTTheater

Pam Kragen Twitter: @pamkragen Facebook: San Diego Theater Critics Circle

PAYING A VISIT Rachel Bonds’ latest play, “At the Old Place,” is set to receive its world premiere at La Jolla Playhouse.

Michele Parente Twitter: @sdeditgirl Facebook: U-T Entertainment

CRITIC’S CHOICE CRITIC’S PICK

George Varga Twitter: @GeorgeVarga Facebook: sdutpopmusic

“A wonderful show and one of the best musicals mounted this season”

The San Diego Union~Tribune

San Diego Reader

Peter Rowe Twitter: @peterroweut Facebook: Brewery Rowe

— Jean Lowerison, SDGLN

“North Coast Rep has raised its own already high bar with its stunning production... a truly memorable theater experience.”

— Midlifeattheoasis

NORTH COAST REPERTORY THEATRE

(858) 481-1055 | NorthCoastRep.org

Night + Day | THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE | THURSDAY • JUNE 29, 2017

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‘POPS’ GOES THE FOURTH S.D. SYMPHONY LAUNCHES BAYSIDE SUMMER NIGHTS SEASON

BY MICHAEL JAMES ROCHA

D

ennis Legg knows what it takes to build a village. That’s because he and his colleagues at the San Diego Symphony pretty much do build a village every summer on a 3½-acre grassy lawn at Embarcadero Marina Park South.

“OK, it’s more like a city, really,” Legg says of the San Diego Symphony’s home for its annual Bayside Summer Nights, which opens the season Friday with “Star Spangled Pops” featuring the San Diego Master Chorale and conductor Lawrence Loh of the West Virginia Symphony.

Every year, just as the symphony season winds down at Jacobs Music Center, Legg shifts his focus away from 750 B St. to the bayside spot. In the span of three weeks, the symphony’s facilities and production teams transform a public park into one of the city’s most coveted outdoor venues.

“Where else can you hear great music, be next to the water, watch fireworks — all in one place,” says Legg, the symphony’s director of facil-

ity operations for the past 12 years.

The San Diego Symphony’s summer series — renamed Bayside Summer Nights from Summer Pops last year — is a popular seasonal tradition, attracting music fans of many genres. As in years past, the new lineup offers a diverse mix — from Wynonna (July 4) and Tony Bennett (July 12) to Dr. John (July 27) and Angélique Kidjo (Aug. 13).

There will be a total of 33 performances during a 10-week span from June 30 to Sept. 3, when the orchestra closes with its crowdpleasing 1812 Tchaikovsky Spectacular, complete with firework cannons.

“It is an amazing experience putting this all together,” says Legg, a San Diego native. “I’ve done it for so long that it’s easy to take for granted just what this means for the community.”

For Legg, long days — he often starts at 8 a.m. — are filled with discussions about structural

SAN DIEGO SYMPHONY PRESENTS BAYSIDE SUMMER NIGHTS: “STAR SPANGLED POPS”

When: 7:30 p.m. Friday, Saturday and Sunday Where: Embarcadero Marina Park South, 200 Marina Park Way, downtown Tickets: $25-$103 Phone: (619) 235-0804 Online: sandiegosymphony.org compliance and health permits and meetings about parking and security.

“One day we’re watering the grass, the next we’re bringing in 2,000 chairs from our warehouse,” he says. “Every day’s different.”

Through all that, he says, there’s one constant: patience.

“You have to be,” says Legg, who admits it’s a quality he’s had

SAN DIEGO SYMPHONY

to hone over the years. “You have to be flexible, and you have to expect that not everything will go your way. When they don’t, you figure out how to get back on track. Something is always going to come up. It’s the nature of the beast.”

Running the location at Jacobs Music Center has its own set of demands, but Legg says erecting Bayside Summer Nights and keeping it going for 10 weeks “isn’t easy. When you’re not dealing with traffic control or janitorial services, you’re dealing with security or something else. It’s definitely intense.”

But he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“To see the look on the patrons’ faces when they’re leaving a show,” Legg says, “to hear the exuberance in their voices, to see the smiles — you can’t put a price tag on that.” michael.rocha@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @outdoorlivingsd

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THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE WEEKLY ENTERTAINMENT GUIDE

29-05 JUNE

JULY

Our top picks for fireworks and festivities throughout the county PAG E S 6 - 1 1

TO BE OR NOT TO BE…

Tickets on sale tomorrow at 12 Noon.

By William Shakespeare Directed by Barry Edelstein

(619) 23-GLOBE (234-5623)

August 6 – September 10

TheOldGlobe.org

Night + Day | THE SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE | THURSDAY • JUNE 29, 2017

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ALPERT’S HORN SHOWS NO RUST WITH THREE NEW ALBUMS PLANNED THIS YEAR, FORMER LEADER OF TIJUANA BRASS IS AS BUSY AS EVER

BY GEORGE VARGA

L

ike Bob Dylan and the late Miles Davis, trumpeter and former Tijuana Brass leader Herb Alpert prefers to look forward, not back.

“I never listened to my albums after I made them, except for maybe a cut here or there,” said the 2006 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee and 2012 National Medal of Arts recipient.

But Alpert made a recent exception when no fewer than 28 of his albums were remastered before being reissued this year. His assessment?

“I was surprised by how good they are!” he said, laughing.

DEWEY NICKS

Could Alpert elaborate?

“I always try to make music out of passion and I loved the process,” said the trumpeter, who performs a Bayside Summer Nights concert next Thursday with his wife, singer Lani Hall, their band and the San Diego Symphony.

“You know my story — I started playing when I was 8, so I’m hooked on music. I’m seduced by the whole idea of recording I met some great mentors in my day.”

One of those mentors was the late, great vocal star Sam Cooke, whose 1960 hit “Wonderful World” was co-written by Alpert.

That was two years before Alpert and Jerry Moss launched A&M Records with $200 between them. Their independent label went on to become the home for everyone from The Carpenters,

SAN DIEGO SYMPHONY BAYSIDE SUMMER NIGHTS PRESENTS HERB ALPERT AND LANI HALL

When: 7:30 p.m. next Thursday Where: Embarcadero Marina Park South, 200 Marina Park Way., downtown Tickets: $25-$100 Phone: (619) 235-0804 Online: sandiegosymphony.org Cat Stevens and Quincy Jones to The Police, Amy Grant and Janet Jackson. Alpert and Moss sold A&M in 1989 for $500 million.

But the first artist to put A&M on the map was Alpert himself.

His worldwide album sales with the Tijuana Brass and as a solo

artist now top 72 million.

He and his band scored 13 Top 40 hits in the U.S. between 1962 and 1967, including “The Lonely Bull (El Solo Torro),” “Taste of Honey” and “Tijuana Taxi.” Alpert went solo in 1968 and quickly scored his first No. 1 song with “This Guy’s in Love With You.” He topped the charts again with “Rise” in 1979. In 2014, he won his ninth Grammy Award.

By the time 2017 ends, Alpert will have released three new albums this year alone and completed a national tour with his band. He is also very involved with the Herb Alpert School of Music at UCLA, now the home to the prestigious Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz.

Alpert, a native of Los Angeles’ Boyle Heights neighborhood, chortled when asked if he now felt a sense of urgency to do as much as possible.

“An urgency because the end is near? Have you spoken to my cardiologist?” he said, laughing again.

The 82-year-old trumpeter grew more serious.

“I’m not kicking back; I’m kicking it forward!” he said, speaking from his Los Angeles home. “I wake up each morning, excited about painting and sculpting and playing my horn. Doing these concerts gives me a lot of energy and pleasure.

“I know I can make a lot of people happy with my music, and I will do that as long as I can. I’ve been very blessed, beyond my dreams.”

But those dreams hit a major roadblock in 1969.

While going through an emotionally wrenching divorce before he married Hall, his wife of 43 years, Alpert found he could no longer play his trumpet. That made his sold-out European concert tour “really torturous,” he recalled.

“It was emotional; I was not in touch with myself. I was thinking: ‘I have the American dream come true.’ I was famous, rich and miserable. That was a real eye-opener for me. I had to see who the heck I was, what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, and whether I wanted to be a musician or not.”

As the conversation drew to a close, Alpert’s interviewer noted that some musicians are just getting to bed at 9 a.m., not doing press.

“Those were the old days, man.

I can’t do that anymore!” he said with a chuckle. “Yeah, them were the old good days.” george.varga@sduniontribune.com Twitter: @georgevarga